A question of cultural identity

Manasseh Faaui (L), 3, Cathy Faaui, Hannah Faaui, 14 months, Joshua Faaui, 5 and Judy Taligalu Mcfall with one of the Samoan books. Photo / Steven McNicholl

Auckland mother Cathy Faaui wants her three children to grow up being able to read, write and speak English and Samoan.

The children were born in New Zealand but Mrs Faaui wants them to know where their family has come from and to have a sense of cultural identity, as she believes it will help them grow into well-rounded adults.

To help them on that path she has enrolled her two boys, aged 3 and 5, in bilingual kindergartens and school and has her 14-month-old daughter on a waiting list.

At school and kindergarten, one of the biggest learning resources the boys have available to them are the Tupu readers - books written in Samoan that they can take home and read with their parents or in class with their teachers.

But news that the Ministry of Education plans to stop producing these books at the end of the year while it reviews the best way to raise Pasifika students achievement levels, means they may no longer have that resource available.

"Imagine if you didn't have any books to read while you were learning English," she said. "[The books] are the tools of their learning."

A South Auckland mother Joanne Okesene, who wrote to Education Minister Anne Tolley when she heard the readers were no longer going to be available, said bilingual units already had too few resources available.

Losing the Tupu and Folauga series would leave centres struggling to find enough books to help bilingual children learn in their own language. At her childrens' school, she has spent hours helping to translate English books into Samoan to give the children a variety to learn from.

Mrs Okesene said her husband grew up in a generation where his parents believed it was better for him to only speak English.

"We want our kids to have an identify and a culture and feel confident with it. If we let it go another generation it will be lost."

She said having her two boys, aged 10 and 12, in bilingual units since they were young has given them confidence and "real self-esteem".

- Elizabeth Binning